Fossil

Why You Should Use Fossil

Or, if not Fossil, at least some kind of modern
version controlsuch as Git, Mercurial, or Subversion.

(Presented in outline form, for people in a hurry)

Benefits of Version Control

Immutable file and version identification

Simplified and unambiguous communication between developers

Detect accidental or surreptitious changes

Locate the origin of discovered files

Parallel development

Multiple developers on the same project

Single developer with multiple subprojects

Experimental features do not contaminate the main line

Development/Testing/Release branches

Incorporate external changes into the baseline

Historical record

Exactly reconstruct historical builds

Locate when and by whom faults were injected

Find when and why content was added or removed

Team members see the big picture

Research the history of project features or subsystems

Copyright and patent documentation

Regulatory compliance

Automatic replication and backup

Everyone always has the latest code

Failed disk-drives cause no loss of work

Avoid wasting time doing manual file copying

Avoid human errors during manual backups

Definitions

Project →
a collection of computer files that serve some common
purpose. Often the project is a software application and the
individual files are source code together with makefiles, scripts, and
"README.txt" files. Other examples of projects include books or
manuals in which each chapter or section is held in a separate file.

Projects change and evolve. The whole purpose of version
control is to track and manage that evolution.

Most projects contain many files, but it is possible
to have a project consisting of just a single file.

Fossil requires that
all the files for a project must be collected into a single
directory hierarchy - a single folder possibly with layers
of subfolders. Fossil is not a good choice for managing a
project that has files scattered hither and yon all over
the disk. In other words, Fossil only works for projects
where the files are laid out such that they can be archived
into a ZIP file or tarball.

Repository →
(also called "repo") a single file that contains
all historical versions of all files in a project. A repo is similar
to a ZIP archive in that it is a single file that stores compressed
versions of many other files. Files can be extracted from the
repo and new files can be added to the repo, just as with a ZIP
archive. But a repo has other capabilities above and beyond
what a ZIP archive can do.

Fossil does not care what you name your repository files,
though names ending with ".fossil" are recommended.

A single project typically has multiple, redundant repositories on
separate machines.

All repositories stay synchronized with one another by exchanging
information via HTTP or SSH.

All repos for a single project redundantly store all information
about that project. So if any one repo is lost due to a disk
crash, all content is preserved in the surviving repos.

The usual arrangement is one repository per user. And since
most users these days have their own computer, that means one
repository per computer. But this is not a requirement. It is
ok to have multiple copies of the same repository on the same
computer.

Fossil works fine with just a single copy of the repository.
But in that case there is no redundancy. If that one repository
file is lost due to a hardware malfunction, then there is no way
to recover the project.

Best practice is to keep all repositories for a user in a single
folder. Folders such as "~/Fossils" or "%USERPROFILE%\Fossils"
are recommended. Fossil itself does not care where the repositories
are stored. Nor does Fossil require repositories to be
kept in the same folder. But it is easier to organize your work
if all repositories are kept in the same place.

Check-out →
a set of files that have been extracted from a
repository and that represent a particular version or snapshot of
the project.

Check-outs must be on the same computer as the repository from
which they are extracted. This is just like with a ZIP archive:
one must have the ZIP archive file on the local machine before
extracting files from ZIP archive.

There can be multiple check-outs (in different folders) from
the same repository.

The repository must be on the same computer as the check-out, but
the relative locations of the repo and the check-out are arbitrary.
The repository may be located inside the folder holding the
check-out, but it certainly does not have to be and usually is
not.

A special file exists in every check-out that tells Fossil from
which repository the check-out was extracted, and which version of
the project the check-out represents. This is the ".fslckout" file
on unix systems or the "_FOSSIL_" file on Windows.

Check-in →
another name for a particular version of the project.
A check-in is a collection of files inside of a repository that
represent a snapshot of the project for an instant in time.
Check-ins exist only inside of the repository. This contrasts with
a check-out which is a collection of files outside of the repository.

Every check-out knows the check-in from which it was derived.
But check-outs might have been edited and so might not exactly
match their associated check-in.

Check-ins are immutable. They can never be changed. But
check-outs are collections of ordinary files on disk. The
files of a check-out can be edited just like any other file.

A check-in can be thought of as an historical snapshot of a
check-out.

"Check-in", "version", "snapshot", and "revision" are synonyms.

When used as a noun, the word "commit" is another synonym
for "check-in". When used as a verb, the word "commit"
means to create a new check-in.

Basic Fossil commands

clone →
Make a copy of a repository. The original repository
is usually (but not always) on a remote machine and the copy is on
the local machine. The copy remembers the network location from
which it was copied and (by default) tries to keep itself synchronized
with the original.

open →
Create a new check-out from a repository on the local machine.

update →
Modify an existing check-out so that it is derived from a
different version of the same project.

commit →
Create a new version (a new check-in) of the project that
is a snapshot of the current check-out.

revert →
Undo all local edits on a check-out. Make the check-out
be an exact copy of its associated check-in.

push →
Copy content found in a local repository over to a remote
repository. (Fossil usually does this automatically in response to
a "commit" and so this command is seldom used, but it is important
to understand it.)

pull →
Copy new content found in a remote repository into a local
repository. A "pull" by itself does not modify any check-out. The
"pull" command only moves content between repositories. However,
the "update" command will (often) automatically do a "pull" before
attempting to update the local check-out.

sync →
Do both a "push" and a "pull" at the same time.

add →
Add a new file to the local check-out. The file must already be
on disk. This command tells Fossil to start tracking and managing
the file. This command affects only the local check-out and does
not modify any repository. The new file is inserted into the
repository at the next "commit" command.

rm/mv →
Short for 'remove' and 'move', these commands are like "add"
in that they specify pending changes to the structure of the check-out.
As with "add", no changes are made to the repository until the next
"commit".

The history of a project is a Directed Acyclic Graph (DAG)

Fossil (and other distributed VCSes like Git and Mercurial, but
not Subversion) represent
the history of a project as a directed acyclic graph (DAG).

Each check-in is a node in the graph

If check-in X is derived from check-in Y then there is
an arc in the graph from node X to node Y.

The older check-in (X) is call the "parent" and the newer
check-in (Y) is the "child". The child is derived from
the parent.

Two users (or the same user working in different check-outs)
might commit different changes against the same check-in. This
results in one parent node having two or more children.

Command: merge →
combines the work of multiple check-ins into
a single check-out. That check-out can then be committed to create
a new that has two (or more) parents.

Most check-ins have just one parent, and either zero or
one child.

When a check-in has two or more parents, one of those parents
is the "primary parent". All the other parent nodes are "secondary".
Conceptually, the primary parent shows the main line of
development. Content from the secondary parents is added
into the main line.

The "direct children" of a check-in X are all children that
have X as their primary parent.

A check-in node with no direct children is sometimes called
a "leaf".

The "merge" command changes only the check-out.
The "commit" command must be run subsequently to make the merge
a permanent part of project.

Definition: branch →
a sequence of check-ins that are all linked
together in the DAG through the primary parent.

Branches are often given names which propagate to direct children.

It is possible to have multiple branches with the same name.
Fossil has no problem with this, but it can be confusing to
humans, so best practice is to give each branch a unique name.

The name of a branch can be changed by adding special tags
to the first check-in of a branch. The name assigned by this
special tag automatically propagates to all direct children.

Why version control is important (reprise)

Every check-in and every individual file has a unique name - its
SHA1 or SHA3-256 hash. Team members can unambiguously identify
any specific
version of the overall project or any specific version of an
individual file.

Any historical version of the whole project or of any individual
file can be easily recreated at any time and by any team member.

Accidental changes to files can be detected by recomputing their
cryptographic hash.

Files of unknown origin can be identified using their hash.

Developers are able to work in parallel, review each others work,
and easily merge their changes together. External revisions to
the baseline can be easily incorporated into the latest changes.

Developers can follow experimental lines of development, then
revert back to an earlier stable version if the experiment does
not work out. Creativity is enhanced by allowing crazy ideas to
be investigated without destabilizing the project.

Developers can work on several independent subprojects, flipping
back and forth from one subproject to another at will, and merge
patches together or back into the main line of development as they
mature.

Older changes can be easily backed out of recent revisions, for
example if bugs are found long after the code was committed.

Enhancements in a branch can be easily copied into other branches,
or into the trunk.

The complete history of all changes is plainly visible to
all team members. Project leaders can easily keep track of what
all team members are doing. Check-in comments help everyone to
understand and/or remember the reason for each change.

New team members can be brought up-to-date with all of the historical
code, quickly and easily.

New developers, interns, or inexperienced staff members who still
do not understand all the details of the project or who are otherwise
prone to making mistakes can be assigned significant subprojects to
be carried out in branches without risking main line stability.

Code is automatically synchronized across all machines. No human
effort is wasted copying files from machine to machine. The risk
of human errors during file transfer and backup is eliminated.

A hardware failure results in minimal lost work because
all previously committed changes will have been automatically
replicated on other machines.

The complete work history of the project is conveniently archived
in a single file, simplifying long-term record keeping.

A precise historical record is maintained which can be used to
support copyright and patent claims or regulatory compliance.

This page was generated in about
0.01s by
Fossil 2.10 [b94e15cff7] 2019-09-13 13:54:36